Well that was one lady who should have stayed in the city.

A woman calls me early this morning. She was out walking her dogs on the road and they ran into the woods on a neighbors property, barking their heads off. She went into the woods after them. There was a coon in a trap.

“A live trap?” I asked.

“No! one of those horrible leg traps” she nearly screamed. She went on to tell me how she had been calling all over and I was the only one who would answer the phone and 911 kept giving her my number. (Maybe she should have waited till after 9 AM to call.)

I asked if the trap was on her property. “No. It’s on the owners He’s not home”

Do you have permission from the owners to be on his property?

“No he has “KEEP OUT” signs.

Are your dogs leashed?

“No, they like to run when we go for walks.”

(the picture was becoming clearer with every word.)

First of all, I said. Get off his property,. You are breaking the law. Second of all, put your dogs on a damn leash. A. There may be more traps, but you are once again breaking the law by not having them leashed.

“But what about the cooooooonnnnnnn”, she whined.

I can’t do anything about that. It is on private property and he maybe trapping that coon because it’s killing his chickens or other stock. It isn’t regular, legal fur trapping season yet, So if if anything, you can report him for that, but it is still on PRIVATE. POSTED PROPERTY. Get off his property.

Get off his land and get your dogs leashed. People WILL be legally trapping for fur by the beginning of October…LEASH YOUR DOGS! It is a way of life for some around here and whether we like it or not, it is against the law to interfere with someone’s traps if they are legally set. You will have no repercussions if your dogs walk into one of these traps.

She had some choice words about “Backwoods Barbarians” and people who don’t care about “Animal rights” and other things before she hung up.

I’m not real fond of leg hold traps, but I understand what it’s like to have animals killing your chickens or rabbits or getting into things they shouldn’t. Each person has to make the choice themselves, how far they want to go. Some animal control companies aren’t much more merciful. Often the animal is trapped in a live trap, but then submerged in water to drown.

The truth is …life is ugly and complicated and far, far removed from the Disney movies we like to believe in. This woman is the kind who will complain about how meat is processed and that “Animals have rights”, while she is eating steak off her fancy plate in her McMansion.

People have rights too and one of the greatest rights is the right to have privacy on their own property without someone and their dogs traipsing all over it.

Sorry lady. I can’t help you. I feel for the coon, but I don’t know the whole story here and neither do you.